Abstract
This article was migrated. The article was marked as recommended. Small group, highly interactive teaching is growing in popularity, making medical school stacked in favor of the extraverted student. The resulting discomfort experienced by introverted students is well documented and troubling. Not just for their wellbeing, but also for the educational climate as a whole. Everyone misses out on learning opportunities when a group of students is not heard or feels uncomfortable to speak up. In this piece, we offer twelve tips to create a safe and comfortable learning environment for all students, regardless of where they find themselves on the introvert-extravert continuum. In these tips we will focus on self-knowledge and perceptions of silence, didactic strategies and learning activities, starting a conversation to become more aware of differences and reflect on them, training for introverted students and fair assessment.
Highlights
Small group teaching in medical education is increasingly popular; there has been a ‘shift toward more interactive teaching strategies ... and group learning venues(Davidson, Gillies and Pelletier, 2015)
Highly interactive teaching is growing in popularity, making medical school stacked in favor of the extraverted student
The resulting discomfort experienced by introverted students is well documented and troubling
Summary
Small group teaching in medical education is increasingly popular; there has been a ‘shift toward more interactive teaching strategies ... and group learning venues (e.g., study table in pods, more open design libraries)(Davidson, Gillies and Pelletier, 2015). Collaborative skills, for example waiting patiently when a team member is thinking and praising and thanking others for their contributions, can help introverted students to feel more comfortable when learning in groups (Jacobs, 2014) This includes enhancing psychological safety within the team or classroom, for example by training active listening skills (such as summarizing and asking (open) follow-up questions to understand the other person’s perspective, while refraining from giving your opinion) and teaching students to adhere to the rules of effective feedback. Evaluation forms in small group education and clerkships typically include items such as: ‘participates in session’ and ‘willing to initiate discussion’ (Davidson, Gillies and Pelletier, 2015) This puts introverted students, with their more reflective thinking style, at a disadvantage, especially since by ‘participation’ teachers generally mean: ‘talking’. A useful tool to get inspired is the so called ‘Quiet student engagement rubric’ developed by The Quiet Revolution group https://www.quietrev.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/RS-Quiet-Student-Engagement-Rubric.pdf
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